You Know You're in a Recession When…

To see how far reaching the recession is, look no further than the Chicago Public Library.

Before the recession, the library system loaned out roughly 7 million books, CDs and movies a year. But today, the annual lending rate has skyrocketed to 9.8 million.

"Honestly, what we've seen is that people have been reevaluating their spending. There's kind of this rediscovery of the library and realizing that that same best-seller you want to go buy at the bookstore … you can get at the library," said Ruth Lednicer, spokeswoman for the library system. "If you can get it on DVD from Netflix, you can get it from the library."

Since the recession started in December 2007, consumers have cut back on vacations, stopped buying cars and run from the real estate market.

And who can blame them? They've seen their retirement savings dwindle, their home values drop and the national debt soar.

To give a further sense of just how much America has changed since the start of the recession, ABC News has taken a look at some key economic indicators and some not-so-likely ones. Here's a snapshot of the economy before and after the recession:

Two Years Ago

Last Year

Today

Monthly Home Foreclosures

148,425

233,001

274,399

Unemployment Rate

4.6 percent

4.9 percent

7.6 percent

Number of Unemployed

7 million

7.6 million

11.6 million

Dow Jones Industrial Average

12,114.10

12,258.90

6,726.02

Value of Americans' 401(k)
Savings

$2.7 trillion

$3 trillion

$2.4 trillion

People on Food Stamps

26.3 million

27.3 million

31.1 million

Chicago Public Library
Circulation

7.4 million

7.8 million

9.8 million

Money Loaned for Mortgages

$2.7 Billion

$2.3 Billion

$1.7 Billion

Number of Homes Sold

7.3 million

5.5 million

4.8 million

Median Home Price

$211,000

$199,800

$170,300

National Debt

$8.8 trillion

$9.4 trillion

$10.9 trillion

Monthly Car Sales

1,090,925

1,043,947

656,976

Percent of Cars Sold by
the Big Three

50.1%

51.2%

42.6%

Bank Failures in February

1

0

10

Annual Personal Bankruptcy
Filings

823,405

1,115,486

1,504,634

Monthly Airline Passengers

60.3 million

61.9 million

54 million

Outstanding Credit Card
Debt

$902.3 billion

$969.6 billion

$994.4 billion

Sources: RealtyTrac, Labor Department, Employee Benefit Research Institute, Department of Agriculture, Chicago Public Library, Mortgage Bankers Association, National Association of Realtors, Treasury Department, Autodata Corp., FDIC, Bankruptcy Data Project at Harvard, Department of Transportation and the Federal Reserve. Figures are for the most recent period of data available.

Welcome Back to Reality

"We've woken from a daydream. We've been walking around as zombies and basically believed that everything was possible and nothing would harm us as a consequence of what we did," said Martin Lindstrom, a brand futurist and author of "Buy-ology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy."